Create a Grandparent’s Book

My niece has been working on a special project for my mother that I’m sure she’s going to love. It’s a Grandparent’s Book, but not the kind a grandparent fills full of memories. In this book, the grandchildren do.

We have a rather large family with thirty grandchildren and ten (or more — I’ve lost count!) great-grandchildren. While this may seem like it would make the task of filling a book easier, it’s actually been a challenge getting everyone to participate in a timely manner. But it will be a very thoughtful gift when it’s finshed!

The book includes photos and letters from the grandchildren to their grandmother. Photos can be older or current, they just have to include the grandmother with one or more grandchildren. Some are sweet, some are silly; some feature certain events, while others are just candid shots.

Each letter in the book was written by a grandchild. Some of the grandchildren recount their favorite memories with their grandmother, while others are appreciative thank-you letters. Still others tell just how much she means to them.

There are lots of options for putting a book like this together. If you and your child enjoy scrapbooking, you could organize it in a scrapbook complete with decorative pages, borders, stickers, and other embellishments. If the other grandchildren involved have some time, each one could create their own scrapbooking page and send it to you to include.

You could also put the book together online and have it printed as a memory books. If you’re using a service that has books made up mostly of photos, you can scan the letters in and save them as a jpeg image. Then insert it as you would a regular photo. This way, the letter could be in the grandchild’s own handwriting.

There are so many sites that offer memory books. Here are a few of them: